The dating game

Dating, The New Paradigm ~ A Threat to Traditional Culture?

Yesterday, Sunday afternoon, DOVE hosted its second seminar on the topic of dating for believing young people, ages 16-23. About 40 young people showed up. As you know, Cambodia was shut off from the world from 1975-1990, and the parents of today’s young people had their education and socialization interrupted. They never learned even basic parenting, relational, and social skills. They possessed little knowledge of how things worked in a functioning society, and the disciplines and decision making that went along with it. Of course these deficits show up today’s youth culture in different ways. After years of being closed to the outside world, Cambodia’s door was opened in the early 90s, only to have the Internet, modern technology, and western culture rush right in like water from a ruptured pipe. No one was ready for this. It has been a Pandora’s box scenario ever since. 

Figure 1 Women Section

Even today, most Cambodian young people have little idea how to filter what comes from the west, especially trends in pop-culture. They typically accept it all without discernment. In one regard, both the USA and Cambodia are both Sibling Societies but for different reasons. In Cambodia, there are very few elders who have not been severely stunted and crippled emotionally by the trauma of genocide. Few older Cambodians remember traditional practices that at one time were helpful for the culture. In the USA, there are few men who have grown up emotionally to become healthy and wise adults, able to give wise counsel and good advice. In both cultures, young people are each other’s advisors, mentors and counselors. In Cambodia, parents don’t talk about sex with their children, they don’t know what to do with the concept of dating since it only became in vogue within that last few years, and if they engage in any guidance or correction, it is usually done in anger with accompanying verbal abuse. 

So, some interested young people came to the four-hour seminar eager to find out what their elders (ages of panelists ranged from 26-57) had to say about navigating the new dating paradigm. What impressed me was that these young people are taking their faith and life seriously. They have seen so many of their friends shipwreck their lives because they followed crowd, just wanting to belong. There is much more pressure to conform here in Cambodia than there is in western culture. The old Asian proverb goes,

“The nail that sticks up higher than the rest is the nail the hammer pounds back into place.”

You have to pay the price of being ostracised, verbally abused, and maybe even experience violence if you dont go along with what your friends are peers are doing. For the seminar, Seila wrote a song about figuring out the dating challenge, and Vysal showed some videos, one was of a Cambodian comedian who brought up some relevant examples of how poor decisions in the dating realm can ruin lives. The young people broke up in small groups to discuss the video. Then, Seila gave a short lecture, introducing the topic and theme, which largely touched on how ‘Dating is here, and it is here to stay. How do we go about dating in a safe way, not ruining our lives, and still respect our parents who don't like it or understand it?"

He then broke them into small groups, and had them write down important questions that they would like to ask someone in the know. When the questions were examined, and consolidated, Vysal, as facilitator, proposed the questions to the panel that consisted of Seila, Bophal and Ms. Un Sophirek. The biggest concern was not actually about dating, but what to do when we find the right person and our parents don’t approve of our choice? In this culture, parents wield an inordinate amount of influence, power, and control over their children. Children exist to bring honor and respect to their parents, which is a lot of pressure on young people. They feel tremendous guilt when their parents are disappointed with them. 

Questions from young women: 

· How do we say no to someone who is persistent in asking us for a date? 

· What criterion should we have for a person who asks us out? 

· What do we talk about on a date? 

· How do we know someone is right for us? 

· What is husband material? 

· How do we know if someone likes us or they are just trying to get us into bed (1 out of 5 Cambodian men have admitted to raping a woman)? 

· If someone asks us out, how can we protect ourselves from rape?

*Women are very susceptible to the sweet-talking men. It is the exception rather than the rule in Cambodia when female children receive love and nurture from their fathers, and by the time they are teens, they crave love from a man. 

Questions from the men:

· Can a man marry a woman much older than him?

· If we love each other and one or both sets of parents don’t agree, how can approach this?

· What can we do in a dating relationship to get to know one another really well?

· What are some things we men do that turn a woman off that we are dating?

· Should we tell the girl we love that we love her, if we do not have the financial capacity to marry her?

Figure 2: Small group work

They young men had fewer questions, but they were also concerned about what to do if their parents did not accept their choice of a spouse. Seila encouraged the young men to be gentlemen, and to treat their dates as if they were their younger sisters. After the panel discussion, Seila split them up again to work on commitment statement that would declare what they would put in practice
that they learned in the seminar on butcher paper. We collected the statements, and will write them up and send them back to the participants. I was surprised when Seila told the young people; “This is new territory and we don't have all the answers for you.” I can't imagine any of his peers ever confessing they did not have all the answers. I was impressed. Some of the advice that came from panel could be challenged by experts, but by and large, here were some elders spending the afternoon helping young people to discover their own dating strategies that would please both God and themselves, and help them to negotiate difficult territory with their parents. It is encouraging to see this group of Christian young people who want to start life on the right foot in an already over sexualized Cambodia. I don’t remember anything being available for me when I was that age. 

Peace to you,

Brian reporting from Phnom Penh